


Snapshot

by robogalaxy



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series), Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Sword & Shield | Pokemon Sword & Shield Versions
Genre: (so many italics), Bittersweet, Brotherly Angst, Brothers, Childhood Memories, Family Feels, Father-Daughter Relationship, Flashbacks, Gen, Heart-to-Heart, Italics, Light Angst, One Shot, Scrapbooks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:47:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27862546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/robogalaxy/pseuds/robogalaxy
Summary: It's been quite a while since Peony's actively thought about the photos of him and his brother that he keeps locked away in his closet.Maybe it was best for him to never remember.
Relationships: Peony & Rose | Chairman Rose, Peony & Shakuya | Peonia
Comments: 3
Kudos: 16





	Snapshot

**Author's Note:**

> hello! quick note, a few of the characters i've referenced in this story belong to @trainerpeony on tumblr - their rose family OCs are just too good not to use. thank you !!

He was home alone, and he debated whether or not to reach to the top of his bedroom closet to grab the old box that holds his Steel uniform. Peony didn't have any plans to try it on again, no, but instead his focus was on the thin but extremely packed album that was tucked away under his jersey. Being home alone meant he could look at the contents of alone and without the prying eyes of anyone to somehow see him during his trip down memory lane.

_Do you really want to, though? I mean, what's in there that's of any value anymore? It's just a photo album. Just pictures of a bygone era, mate._

And yet, Peony creaked open the closet in his room and scanned the shelves (eyes having to pass over multiple old purses of his wife's and the small boxes in which he kept all of Nia's Father's Day cards from when she was in primary school) before he came across the one he was looking for. Wide, extremely dusty, and with the League's logo on its side, Peony shook his head and reached for it. It was lighter than he remembered it, though that wasn't what was at the forefront of his mind as he turned around and dropped the box onto the bed behind him. One deep breath later, Peony lifted the lid off of the box and threw it behind him with force (it didn't seem to bother him that it wobbled the floor lamp with a dangerous sounding _thud_ ). There was his uniform, folded pristinely with nary a wrinkle. Peony knew that it had to be his wife's doing, as he was not coordinated enough to make sure the sleeves lined up. He'd have to thank her for it when he could. So many memories come from his uniform, Peony noticed, and he smiled to himself as the bright _082_ on the front of the jersey shone in the light of his room. Next, he picked up the shorts and socks to throw them aside. All that was left in the box now was the album, extremely dusty and engraved with golden letters. He picked it up gingerly and awkwardly shifted it between his hands. 

"Rose," Peony muttered, "yeah, that's us alright." Fingers traced over the lettering of his family name, and he felt his heartbeat quicken. He was holding it now, but he wondered if it was even worth the trouble. The closet door was still open, his uniform and its box still right in front of him.

_It's just a photo album. Just pictures of a bygone era, mate._

Peony put away his uniform and its box back to its perch in the closet and shut the doors. Dusting his hands off, Peony threw himself onto the bed and looked up to the ceiling. A hand traced over the cover of the album again while he sat himself up to lean against the headboard.

"Well, let's see what I'm gettin' myself into," he sighed with hesitation, "maybe I'll find somethin' worthwhile I forgot all about."

He opened the cover and was immediately greeted with a photo of his mother in a hospital bed, eyes tired and her smile anything but. In her arms, she cradled a baby in a blanket. Judging by the baby's dark skin and the fact that in the background stood his father with a young Rose, Peony surmised the baby had to be him. He flipped the photo over to read his mother's delicate handwriting through the glossy cover.

_Peony Rose, 18/5/1979_

_3kg 855g_

_7:55pm_

A light smile reached his face as he looked over the picture as a whole. His mother's smile was so radiant and his father's look so prideful. How amazing it was for them to have their second child, another beautiful son (at least, that's where their thoughts lied before the brothers had managed to get older and attitudes began to change about their sons' worth). Young Rose, in what looked like childish pajamas in the background, looked so curiously at Peony. The wonderment of a new sibling at such a young age must've been a little hard to adjust to, so his expression of confusion was explainable. Peony looked to the next picture in the album, where he felt his heart drop just a bit. There he was, in all his three hour old glory, being held in the arms of his fascinated brother. That charming curl of hair still framed his face, but this face looked so innocent. 

_How did we ever get to where we are now? Not that I'd like to be back being cradled in his lap by any means..._

Peony felt a tad upset looking at the photo and only felt the sinking settle deeper when his mother's handwriting on the back appeared once more. 

_Brothers' First Meeting!_

_18/5/1979_

_10:57pm_

Peony would rather not have focused on the meaning of that photo nor would he have appreciated having to think on it much further, so he skipped over the rest of the pictures that showed the new family of four together, and he went to the point in the album's timeline in which he was a fairly competent child. 

_Fairly competent... it just means I could feed, bathe, and dress myself. I wasn't any sort of genius kid like Antony was, already able to memorize his bloody times tables._

Looking at the next picture's year, 1985, cemented Peony at around six years old and his brother beside him at about eight. They stood side by side in the front of their yard, excitedly popping the bubbles their mother's Azumarill made for them. Both him and Rose's legs were covered in bandages and both of their faces were messy with what seemed to be leftover residue from a dessert. There's so much joy in the picture, so much nostalgia that it was close to overwhelming him. 

"Wow, and Mum really let us go out looking like _that_?" Peony chuckled to get his eyes unfocused on the clear adoration the young boys in the picture had for each other, "I look like a little Greedent, that's what! Funny of her to pass on the photos in which I look most like her rambunctious one. Not that I _wasn't_ ," he laughed again. Fingers carded through more pictures of the family from Peony's childhood - Rose and him in front of Hammerlocke stadium with their dad proudly putting _both_ his hands on Rose's shoulders, a blurry photo Peony had taken of his newly born baby sister himself (complete with his thick, childish handwriting on the back that attempted to spell "Catherine"), a few photos of Peony smiling excitedly with his new braces on (they weren't that fun in the long run, actually), family photos where Peony had forgotten how artificial some of his smiles were, and a photo of Peony with a pout that reminded him a little too much of Nia. That warmed his heart, though, and he smiled softly at it. He'd have to compare pictures later on, and he'd better make it quick if he wanted to do it before Nia got back from errands with her mother. 

"Huh?" Peony said as he realized the next picture was turned backwards, "That's a bit off." To no surprise, the same blue letters that described every other picture were present on this one as well, and in his mother's handwriting were three short lines of writing. 

_Dahlia and Isla_

_8/9/1986_

_Their first Pokémon ♡_

Peony almost didn't want to see the picture now that he clearly knew what he was going to see. 

_Why do you want to look at it? Why would you want to look at it? You've hurt yourself enough just lookin' at the earlier ones._

Despite the tightening of his chest, Peony sighed and turned the translucent page over.

 _Just as I remember it,_ he thought to himself as he took in the utter look of joy on Rose's slowly squaring face and his own face squished against his Cufant as he gave her a hug, _we chased after the lil' rascals for what seemed like eras_. 

That was one of the best days of his life, at one point, going out with his shining example of a big brother to go catch Cufants that roamed through the tall grass of the Wild Area. The Cufants they ended up capturing were sisters much like the two of them were brothers, and it pleased the young boys immensely. 

_They're like us, Antony! They're siblings too!_

He remembers distinctly that Rose skinned both his knees that day but didn't cry, and he excellently demonstrated how to throw a wicked Poké Ball in front of an awestruck Peony. However, the words that needed to be emphasized were "at one point," and Peony now only saw the day as a great afternoon sandwiched in between a mediocre morning and night. 

"Isla was a wee thing, wasn't she?" Peony said, "I mean, she's a beast now, so just lookin' at her here is... wow. Times go by too fast, I'll say." 

"Dad! Mum and I are back!" called out a peppy voice alongside the shutting of their front door (the other woman's voice muttering that Nia knew better than to _slam_ doors). 

_So much for comparing my darlin's baby pictures_ , Peony thought. With his trip down memory lane suddenly hindered by a roadblock, Peony shut the album and went to put it back in its rightful place burrowed beneath his uniform's jersey, but he was out of luck. Nia had already managed to weasel her way up the stairs and just so happened to stop and see her parents' bedroom door wide open. 

"Ugh, you're not thinkin' about trying that on again, are you? I'm not gonna bend and help recreate the picture ten years ago—"

"Peonia," he interrupted, halting his daughter in her words quicker than he had anticipated, "do me the honors of comin' and lookin' at these pictures with me! I'm gettin' to about the time I met your mum, actually." He smiled quickly to cover up his sudden somberness, but Nia was too clever to let his words slip. 

_Peonia. He full-named me, but not in the "young miss, you are in TROUBLE" way. Why does he seem so dejected?_

"Dad," she replied, "you know I've schoolwork to do, right?"

"Oh, no you do _not_! You did it all Friday so you could go out with your mum in the first place," he reminded her, "unless you lied about finishing it?"

"...Scoot over, then," Nia sighed as she walked out of the doorway and hopped onto the bed, "let me see what sort of things you thought were worth the money for prints." 

"I thought you'd change your mind, darlin'!" Peony smiled, and with this, he picked the album up again, left behind the pictures of his childhood, and moved on to the snapshots of when he believed his life truly began. He showed Nia his early (and incredibly tacky) league card photos with him playing up the robotic aspect of the Steel uniform's design, as well as walking her through entire stories of how each photo of him and his wife came to be (with Nia nodding every eleven or so words, just to make sure it _looked_ like she was listening intently). Peony stopped shifting through the pages for a moment as he pointed to a wedding photo.

"I keep forgetting how tacky of a suit you wore to your own _wedding_ , Dad," Nia teased, "like, honest. Were you trying to look like some sort of Tamato Berry or something?"

As much as Peony would've loved to snark back with his daughter about the design of his outfit, his eyes were only drawn to the man that stood proudly by his side. His eyes were kind, a smile adorned his face as he leaned against Peony, and his lone curl still hung in front of his face. Rose was his Best Man, but now someone Peony would consider more of a spotlight-stealing, duplicitous coward. 

_We were children in those last photos_ , Peony thought, _so I couldn't quite place the bastard name to some little lad like that._

However, now that both the brothers were adults, Peony felt no guilt in insulting him (at least, no more than the guilt he already felt scratching at his chest every time Rose's name came up). 

"Tamato, huh? I thought I looked more Cheri myself," he lightly laughed before turning to the next photo with less enthusiasm that he had when Nia first walked into the room.

"Wait, Dad, stop for a bit! Can you go back a couple of photos?" 

"Hm? Sure thing, lovely," Peony complied, "which one were you after?" 

"I'll find it," she explained as she whisked the album away from her father's grasp and turned back to another photo from his wedding day. Nia perked up when she found it and pointed to it. 

"This one? What about it's so cool?" Peony asked, looking down at the five people in the photo. From left to right were his wife's older sister, his wife, himself, Rose, and their younger sister. They all stood with wide grins and held champagne glasses. Peony had an arm around Rose's shoulder while Rose supported Peony in the same way. Peony briefly turned the picture over to look at the handwriting on the back (still his mother's recognizable print).

_Best Man (and Woman), Maid of Honor and the Newlyweds_

_(L to R) Veronica, Lola, Peony, Antony, and Catherine_

_19/10/2004_

"Are you and uncle Antony wearing matching earrings? That's kind of funny. Never took either of you for earring kind of people," Nia explained, her finger pointing to the Cufant studs in both her father and her uncle's ears, "but it was a different time, I guess." 

"Yeah," Peony mumbled as a hand absentmindedly reached to feel where he'd let his piercing grow back up, "yeah, way different." Nia nodded. 

"Well, that's all. You can go on now." 

"Oh, can I! Yeah, I can," responded Peony with a jolt, as if he'd just been thrown out of deep thought, "of course." He did as told while he and Nia looked over photos of Peony's gym leader shoots with her mother happily showing up in a few for show, with later ones showing she was obviously pregnant. They passed over a few pictures of Peony's ridiculously over the top photos with his Pokémon before arriving at a photo of a hospital room. Peony sat beside a woman with an Igglybuff patterned bundle in her arms and her thumb gently caressing the baby's face. 

"Gah, weren't you just a doll when you were born," Peony said, "I mean, just _look_ at you! Your lil' fat face and your wispy blonde hair...an absolute doll!" He ended his sentence by turning to place a kiss on his daughter's cheek, something she rolled her eyes at but accepted all the same. Peony gushed about the day Nia was born as he flipped through the photos of friends and family with the new parents, stopping at what he thought was a picture of Catherine proudly holding her niece. Instead, it was his _brother_ that cradled Nia with a warm smile on his face. Flipping it over, Peony read more handwriting (now his wife's, if he was correct). 

_Peonia and Antony_

_20/11/2006_

_3:25 am_

_It's the same expression_ , Peony noticed, it's the same exact look on his face from when he first held Peony. _That softness, curiosity... where was that love? Something that's probably way below him, now._

" _Dad_? Dad, what's wrong?" Nia called out as she saw her father raise a hand to his face to stop tears from falling down onto the album, "Dad?" 

"You don't have any siblings, Peonia," he stated firmly, "you're an only child." 

"Yes...? Don't tell me that you and Mum are reconsidering that," Nia joked with a nervous smile on her face. This was _her_ father - Peony Rose, excitable 'til the very end - and he was trying not to sob.

"No, no," Peony responded. He stood up off the bed with the album in hand, turning to that beloved photo and studying the innocence on their faces, remembering a time where they meant something to one another. Reading the back again, Peony coughs to stop another bout of crying from beginning. 

_Dahlia and Isla_

_8/9/1986_

_Their first Pokémon ♡_

"No, that's not it," he continued as he slammed the album shut and tossed it back into the box with his uniform, "no, you're an only child. I'm so happy for that." 

"And...why's that?" Nia hesitated asking, standing up off the bed to hug her father from behind, extremely concerned for him in an instant. 

"You'll never decide to look through a photo album for old times' sake and realize you don't feel a connection with your own flesh and blood, Peonia. You'll never, ever, have to come to the conclusion your brother doesn't even feel like family anymore." He shut the box by putting the lid back on it and threw it back into the closet; he made sure to put it farther back this time so he wouldn't feel the need to look nor get the reminder that tangible proof of happy memories of him and Rose still existed somewhere. 

"You understand that, love?" Peony asked while turning Nia around to face him for a minute, "Understand just how lucky you are that you don't have to worry."

"I wish you didn't have to understand, papa," Nia responded hesitantly as she threw herself into Peony's arms and allowed him to stroke through her hair, "I wish he still felt like your brother."

"Me too, lil' love," Peony responded while he thought about the excited hug shared by him and Rose after the final shake of his Poké Ball, "me too."

**Author's Note:**

> peony loves his brother, peony loves his daughter, peony just has a lot of emotions. fun for all involved! technically my last first fic of 2020 AND my first fic of 2021. here's to more stories to share! 
> 
> thank you SO much for reading! feel free to leave kudos, comments, and bookmarks!~ <3


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